Business Email: How to Turn a Complaint into a Suggestion

Hi everyone. I'm Jennifer from English  with Jennifer. If you've been following me,  

then you know that I recently traveled to Paris.  It was a wonderful trip overall. I'm here back in  

Massachusetts, and as you can see I'm at my desk.  There's something I'd like to share with you.  

Well, if you'd followed me, you know that there  were a couple of problems that came up during the  

trip. And well, the first one has been resolved.  It was with Lufthansa. When we arrived in Paris,  

we did not receive our luggage, and it was  delayed. It wasn't lost. It was delayed.  

It was back in Frankfurt. It took time to  reach us in Paris. Even when it was in Paris,  

I waited three days to receive my suitcase, and  my children had to wait five days to receive  

theirs. During that time, we did incur  some expenses. We had to buy toiletries,  

some clothing. And today here back at home, I  was able to submit my receipts and a request  

for reimbursement, so fingers crossed and  perhaps I will be reimbursed. But of course,  

the important thing is that we did receive  our luggage before our trip ended. And I'm  

happy to say that once we came back to Boston,  our luggage arrived as well, so we were able to  

leave the airport with our suitcases here in  Boston. Now the second thing that came up was  

a fine in the Paris Metro. And I accept that when  you break a rule, there's a consequence. It still  

is upsetting a little bit because it was something  that could have been avoided if we had known about  

the rule that we ended up breaking. So this is  not about anger. It's not about venting. I've  

I had my moments later at the hotel to complain  to sympathetic hotel staff, who listened to me,  

and they told me their stories about being find  as well. But what I decided to do, actually at the  

urging of one of the hotel staff members, was to  write. And it's really not about complaining. It's  

more about making a suggestion at this point. I  want to be constructive. This is not about being  

critical, but being constructive because I really  believe that I am not alone in this experience.  

In fact, I saw this happen to other tourists,  and I believe that it's something that could be  

avoided. It could be reduced if, you know, further  action were taken by the RATP. That's the Paris  

metropolitan transport system or something like  that...transport system or transit system. The  

RATP. And I want to emphasize, by the way, that  the majority of workers were very kind, helpful,  

patient. A lot of them spoke English, and even  when they didn't, they were so patient as I tried  

with my limited French to explain things that I  needed, so they were there ready to help. It was,  

overall, a very positive experience, but we  did get fined our final night because we didn't  

have a valid ticket. So, I had one. My son had  one. My daughter had one, but on the way out,  

she had thrown it away. There's trash bins in  the metro, and she threw her ticket away. And  

as we were exiting, they checked for tickets. She  didn't have one, and they were so no-nonsense. It  

was like, "Cash or credit card? You pay a fine. 50  euros." So, we did. I believe that other tourists  

have been....not believe...I know have been fined  for this, are probably being fined even today,  

and will continue to be fined for this violation  because we're simply not aware. So again, I want  

to be constructive and offer a suggestion. So,  what we're going to look at together is an email  

that I drafted. In fact, I sent it off already  via the RATP website, and just to be sure that  

someone receives it, I also submitted it via  private message on Facebook. So, it's my hope  

that someone will receive the suggestion and  take it into consideration. My goal right now  

is to share it with you because perhaps it will  be useful for you to see how I approached this.  

How did I organize it and what kind of wording did  I use to offer my suggestion? Let's take a look.  

Okay. Let's look at the overall  organization. First, we have a greeting.  

I wrote a lot, so it's broken into  paragraphs. I always suggest that.  

Closing. Signature. You can tell by the closing  this is a formal email: Best regards. However,  

I did not use the highest level of formality. I  could have used "Dear Sir or Madam." I don't know  

who's going to be reading this; however, in most  business correspondence today, "hello" is fine.  

It's acceptable. It's polite. It's certainly  more concise, so I believe that "hello" works  

in this situation just fine. I also decided to  open up immediately -- state my purpose: What's  

my intention? Why am I writing this? I give some  background information, and I start with a little  

bit of positive before I get to the main issue. I  explained the issue in detail. Right around here  

is where I start to make a call to action. It's  a suggestion. I repeat that request at the end,  

so that's the basic approach I used. Again,  you'll see a level of formality here. I use no  

contractions. I use polite language like "I would  like to." Okay. Let's read through. Hello. I would  

like to offer a suggestion based on my recent trip  to Paris from the 15th to the 21st of August 2023.  

A quick note here is if I were writing  to an American company, I would have used  

month-day-year. Since my reader is in Europe, I  decided to use the more common format in Europe,  

which is day or yeah, day-month-year. So,  I'm trying to meet them halfway here. From  

the 15th through the 21st of August. Okay. My  two teenage children and I navigated the Paris  

Metro for the first time. On the whole, our  experience was positive. Metro workers were  

patient when helping us purchase the necessary  tickets. Over the course of our seven-day stay,  

we bought a combination of tickets, including  Paris Visite and single-use tickets. However,  

while safety rules are clearly visible to metro  users, the rules of ticket usage are not. No one  

explained the need to have tickets upon exiting a  station. We learned the hard way. On the evening  

of the 20 August 2023 -- again I'm using that more  more common format in Europe -- while exiting at  

Alma-Marceau (that's a station), we were stopped  by security and requested to present our tickets.  

It was our final night in Paris, and  we had bought single-use tickets.  

I had retained my ticket, as had my son, but my  daughter had just thrown hers away in a trash  

can in the metro. Since she could not present  a valid ticket, she was immediately fined 50  

euros. We had to present my daughter's passport  for the ticket to be written up. I paid the fine  

by cash and received a receipt, and here since  I looked at the online form, by the way, there's  

no option to upload or make an attachment, so I'm  writing some of the details from the ticket here.  

Later on the way back into the station, we saw  more tourists being stopped and fined for the  

same reason, which gave the strong impression  that tourists are targeted for this infraction.  

While we recognize that we violated a rule of  the RATP, we wish to emphasize that we were not  

aware that the rule existed. I later spoke with  a metro cashier at Porte de Clichy (that's another  

station), and she pointed to a set of rules  in small print at the far end of the lobby.  

I suspect that few tourists see those rules;  we certainly did not. What tourists see is  

the information posted around the  ticket counter regarding pricing.  

We also see information posted around the ticket  machines, on the platforms, and in the trains. If  

you wish to inform all passengers of the rules,  then I strongly recommend posting the rules along  

with a visual aid (e.g., meaning "for example" --  a hand holding a ticket) at every ticket machine  

with the reminder in French and other common  languages of visiting tourists: "old on to your  

validated ticket at all times." Or "Please retain  your validated ticket until you exit the metro."  

Paris is a favorite tourist destination, and  thousands of us enjoy visiting your wonderful  

city. Unfortunately, the experience of being fined  for a rule that we were not aware of affects our  

impression of Paris and the quality of our stay.  If you wish for tourists to follow the rules,  

the RATP must take greater measures to educate  us. Fining passengers who are often unaware of  

the rules is not the best means. Thankfully,  we had plenty of other encounters with kind  

Parisians inside and outside of the metro  that offset this negative experience, but  

it is unnecessary to make this a common experience  among tourists, who arrive with the wish to enjoy  

and appreciate the beauty of your city. I hope  you will take my suggestion into consideration to  

improve the service and experience of the RATP.  Thank you for your attention. Best regards, me.

That's all for now. Please remember to like and  share the video if you found the lesson useful. As  

always, thanks for watching and happy studies!  Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter,  

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